Amanda Apicella
Thanks for sitting down to share with our readers where you grew up and walking us through your journey through life. How did your family and surroundings influence you in your formative years?
I was born in Tajrish Shemiran (Dezashib off Niavaran Street by the still standing firehouse) in Tehran IRAN, as the eldest of six siblings, including three sisters, the youngest of whom is sixteen years younger than me! We moved to Evin when I was just a toddler, to our still standing home alongside the Parkway, where after completing K-12 public schooling (Shahpour Tajrish High School) in Baghe Ferdows and receiving my chemistry degree from the National University, I moved to the U.S. in the summer of 1979 to “pursue” my (pre-/post-) doctoral studies just to return home upon graduation; one could surmise that my lifelong educational “pursuit” and permanent home return have not yet been fulfilled?! My living parents in their 80’s, born in Natanz, moved to Tehran as teenagers. My father was a school clerk, whom recorded and pen/abacus calculated grades and GPAs, and ultimately send grade-reports (karnameh) home to parents. Thus, education was deemed to be the key to upward socioeconomic mobility back then which may still apply anywhere today.
What pastime did you have while growing up in Evin Tehran?
Our pastime when teenagers was to play plastic ball soccer with small goal, or play taboukar, a baseball like game with a home-made batting stick and tennis ball, alak dolak, and later hiking mountains often to Tochal peak (4200 meters) where I stayed in Palanghcal, Kolakchal or Shirpala shelters. Beginning each mid-spring, we raided the fruit orchards in Evin to enjoy the bounties of chaghleh badoom (green almonds) and gojeh (green plums), mulberries, blackberries (shah-toot), cherries, pomegranates, apricots and peaches, pears and grapes, apples, quince, meddlers, and persimmons. Our hide and seek games spanning across dozens of homes, grain and vegetable fields and orchards, began every day at dusk and fizzled away at midnight! I had to conceal on a blind spot high on a tree to eat mulberries for hours. An easy source of packet money was to pick bouteh (dried pricked bushes) from the hillside now occupied by Evin Prison, and sell it to neighbors and drivers on the Parkway for fire festival, Chaharshanbeh Souri, and as the prelude to Nowruz! I completed the English National Institute evening diploma (12 semesters) at 16. When my father once bragged to his senior uncle Akbar at a Nowruz visit about my “overachievement”. The uncle looked at me for the first time and asked me one question: How would you say Tokhmeh Kadoo (pumpkin seeds) in English and as he was cracking them! He scolded my father of having wasted his money on a loser who claims to have an English diploma two years before high school diploma and yet does not know the name of such a simple snack!
What has been your personal key to success? What were the biggest inspirations for your career?
My family was not materially rich; nonetheless, we were blessed with nurturing parents and tough love, surrounded by extended family and circle of friends. In fact, throughout my early life, we had to scavenge to make ends’ meet. Borrowing interest-free loans from the more distant affluent side of the family to build our first house and later to add a second floor to it, was a major impetus for the family’s upward mobility from the fringes of the poverty line. My father grudgingly took me once a year to Baab-Homayoun where he bought me a new suit for a few dollars before the New Year heralded by Nowruz; the sweet and sour nostalgia was that the suit was always a few sizes larger than my actual size but he would insist I would soon grow into it, which I never did! Amongst my friends were some even poorer than we were, but most were from the rapidly emerging aristocratic and extremely affluent technocrats, merchants, governments ministers, and a few with the royal lineage. Hence, like a great many other friends, from primary school onwards I recognized the need to work part-time and study full-time in order to break away from the vicious cycles of struggles.
Could you share with us a few more examples of odd jobs you held while in K-12 School and how you entered college?
Among a rather large number of odd jobs and apprenticeships (fruits picking, blacksmith, shoemaking, bakery, tutoring) I pursued to make a few pennies, golf caddying in the newly constructed 18-holes Royal Golf Club less than a mile from my home, was tough but rewarding. Later I served as an English interpreter at the annual summer International Trade Fair and Expositions across the Parkway. This experience allowed me to improve my English as my third language; of course after our native Persian, and a half-hazard Arabic! That said, my parents instilled in me the importance of quality of life and a perpetual sense of reciprocity towards the community should far outweigh materialism; money is, we were told, a relative means to a comfortable existence, but must not overshadow over lives. Later, while still attending college, English became my bread and butter. I tutored private lessons, while managing 14 daily ESL classes at Armaghan Tarbiat K-9 School on Pahlavi Avenue. This historic school still stands alongside the sycamore lined avenue – a one of a kind in southwest Asia. Let me reiterate although I ranked among the few peers from 1st to 7th grades, I strayed down to a run of the mill student with repeat exams each August during 8th to11th. Then, I finally completed diploma only by studying after Nowruz that year, to earn 17.5/20.0 GPA and passed Konkur to enter the university, a competitive entrance process for less than 10% high school graduates to enter.
Your fields of interest appear diverse and are seemingly unrelated to a layperson…. Could you highlight certain areas of particular interest to you?
Analytical chemistry, a modern branch of chemistry, which deals with “what specific substances are present, say in a bodily fluid or organ as in a physiologically native region (e.g., brain, kidney), how much of each substance is present, and how their fate relate to manifestation of specific disease or curing a malady at the molecular level,” is anchored to the development of biosensors. This has remained a major part of my research. Most my research contributions spans across probing fundamental questions in clinical, environmental, forensics, and medical challenges and as outlined in our book entitled, Bioimaging in Neurodegeneration as well as a prolific number of manuscripts on progress in neuropsychopharmacology and biological psychiatry. Opportunistically speaking, however, and in light of my recognized lack of access to cheap pre-/post-doctoral intellect and sophisticated instrumentation, I have collaboratively carried out mutually beneficial research projects with cross-disciplinary colleagues at myriad other universities (Oxford, Copenhagen, Rome, Florence, New Orleans, Stony Brook) as well as with peers at a number of corporate R&D centers and foundations (IBM, PEPSI, CIBA, AKZO-NOBEL, BASF, AMERICAN HEALTH FOUNDATION.)
You are a recipient of many awards. What has been your “secret of success?”
If there are any accolades that accompany an award, then the credit genuinely belongs to more than one individual; the students, peers and colleagues who inter-collaboratively brought a project to fruition are equally deserving. Life, without a perpetual path of learning, sharing, nurturing, imparting and a conscientious sense of advancing humanity and justice might have as well been a far less meaningful journey for us all, right?!
What are the avenues of research that you are exploring for the next few years?
I continue remaining abreast of, and contribute to, the much-anticipated integration of in-vivo biosensors in the human body for real-time monitoring, control, regulation and drug delivery in specific physiological organs. That said however, and as I am perambulating the final path of my career trajectory, I am progressively taking more university administrative roles, while my scholarship is increasingly drawn to writing on the arts and culture, archaeology and history, science, environment and policy, poetry and prose, especially as these relate to Iran and southwest/south central Asia. Moreover, my goal is to play a more crucial role in propelling the Persian diaspora forward.
What are the lingering challenges and emerging opportunities in chemistry and education?
It is mind-boggling to compare the ever-expanding number of chemical molecules discovered or the chemical articles published; they currently stand at 50 and 100 million, respectively, compared to a mere one million words in the English language! For every chemical/scientific discovery, 100 new questions worthy of further investigation arise. The education and training of chemists is rapidly transforming, due in part to pedagogical innovation and instructional, computational and simulational technologies. It is, however, ironic that despite access to some of the best instructional technologies and pedagogical methodologies that science and math competencies for K-12 in the U.S. falls far behind countries like Iran, Vietnam or even North Korea. Luckily, thanks to a disproportionately large number of international (post-) doctoral students and immigrants, from war-torn nations, American universities have benefited from this international brain drain since WWII.
What is the biggest challenge that you have faced in your career?
Enriched with our historical heritage from our ancestral nation of Iran, we are indeed blessed to live here, where we have effectively raised our children and give back to our adopted land, AMRIKA (in Persian it pronounces as work for life!) Yes, the US is the best place there is with all its opportunities and challenges. However, the lingering impasse between the governments in Iran and the U.S. over the past four decades, have negatively impacted advancing our career prospects. This is especially true for the achieving mid- to upper-career level opportunities aspired by exemplary Iranian-Americans. One might argue that this is, to a certain extent, self-inflicted (induced by low self-esteem) or perhaps due to relentless politically-charged rhetoric by the media from both sides. The fact still remains, the same propaganda turns the tides of public opinion and turns decision-makers against people of Iran and, by extension, against Iranian-Americans. The result is over-achievement by Iranian-Americans in education and superior career advancement through hard work, and as they defy the odds to advance. Despite overachievement, many in our community opt for less risky career paths to mix in and be a bigger fish in a smaller pond per se. I opted for exactly that, but in the long run it enabled me to strike a balance between job and community and family roles. So, many of us live our entire lives between a twilight rock and a hard place, none of which we have ever had anything to do with….
You are or have been actively involved at a leadership level in many organizations …. Why you are so passionate about the community and what do you believe the future holds?
A major hallmark of my tripartite activities in higher duration is multifaceted service, whereby advancing or contributing toward learned and professional societies, government advisory panels, and international development are primacy priority. The advancement of humanity and community, equality and harmony, and justice and peace, all anchored on altruism, philanthropy and volunteerism, is in our genetic makeup. These values can be gleaned from our Persian literati poems, prose and ethos, the philosophical doctrine for a balanced and meaningful life in a cohesive community.
So, I did nothing beyond the ordinary, except to learn from, and simply follow in the footsteps of our historical giants, including Ferdowsi, Rumi, Algorithm, Hafez, Sa’adi, Avicenna and Razes, as well as more contemporary ones like Forough Farrokhzad, Parvin Etessami, Ahmad Shamlou, Amir Kabir, Mohammad Moin, or the exemplary leaders among us in the U.S.
Can you share your thoughts on your Iranian-American identity? What does it mean to be an Iranian-American?
This is where the rubber hits the road. As much as we may conceal our ethnicity in reaction to xenophobic stereotyping and culture bashing in the US or fear of persecution elsewhere, through portraying ourselves as the more popular immigrants, Italians or Greeks, it is only becoming exemplary world/American citizens as great as the American apple pie, that we should proudly declare ourselves to be IRANIAN-AMERICANS. We cannot avoid the sheer fact that even after many generations, that we, to most mainstreamers, are perceived as Persian watch cats at best, and not the American watch dogs! Our conundrum is further exacerbated so long as the two governments of Iran and the U.S. fail to respect each other, embrace the free exchange of arts, culture, science, technology and remove trade embargos. My thoughts should not be misconstrued when I advocate for saving the baby and bath, while trusting people to peacefully and civilly cleanse the bath water!
I am not favoring any government or political system as they have all emerged at one short historical juncture, and disappeared over time. What’s far more critical is to safeguard the dignity and the well-earned stature of a diverse people and their secular society, human and democratic constitutional rights, which are anchored on the sovereignty, security and heritage of a nation. Let me reiterate again, that our Persian ethnicity and culture (read Iran and Ireland) is complementary to our newly adopted naturalization in the U.S., both combined make us more resilient and confident in doing our very best in life and the community, and in the nation and beyond.
Having just returned from the Harvard Iranian Weekend Forum, the large and as usual most impressive attendees and speakers, several hundred in number, were charged with the theme “ENGAGE.” Allow me to take the liberty to expand this theme with more consequential “E” words as Entice, Enrapture, Educate, Energize, ENGAGE, Enable, Empower, Effectuate, Enrich, and Implore….The paradigm shift for a loosely held coalition of diverse Iranian American organizations, which could unite on a few hallmarks, such as empowering our Iranian American community and our future generations that the time to appreciate their ancestral heritage and culture is NOW. This is congruent with E pluribus unum, out of many, ONE!
Would you wish to share your last thought here with readers?
Summarizing, I have confidence in our families and community in the diaspora, as well as our 85 million brethren back in Iran and five million of us in diaspora, who despite short-run trials and tribulations, will in the long run triumph and opt for socioeconomic and political progress and remain among the most vibrant and immensely contributing people to humanity across the pond. Our brothers and sisters have spread out across almost every continent since pre-historic times.
Irrespective of our diversity in faith or background, we are united in adhering to the golden rule of treating others as you wish to be treated, the golden rule of treating others as you expect to be treated, anchored on faith in the three Zoroastrian tenets of good thought, good words and good deeds. Living Persian life the fullest, no one could ever more masterfully encapsulate the Iranian ethos and life psyche than the 13th century Persian poet Sa’adi:
All Humans are members of one frame,
since they all, from the same essence, came
When one frame member becomes distressed,
the others lose their desired rest
If thou feel’st not for others’ misery,
the name Human, is no name for thee
Professor Rahni, I thank you very much for your sharing perspectives in life and wish you all the best in your continued endeavors. And I thank you readers for being with us. Have a great day!